The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 – frequently known as Obamacare – could have been named the Law Meant to Ensure that No One is Left Out in the Cold.

In the wake of Monday's Supreme Court ruling that allows some companies to opt out of a particular provision in the health-care act, it is important to remember why the law was needed in the first place, why Democrats and progressives fought for such legislation for fully a century. Simply put, the law was needed because without it, too many people had either no health insurance at all, or had shoddy coverage that was insurance more in name than in fact.

Specifically, the high court's 5-4 decision allows some closely held companies to claim a religious exemption so that they can keep contraception out of the hands of female employees.

Ours is a nation of laws. Folks don't get to decide which laws they choose to follow and which they don't believe in. Allowing someone's religious dictates to rule the day is only a couple of steps away from lawlessness.

In the case before the court, Hobby Lobby, a privately held company owned by a family of believers, claimed a religious exemption to Obamacare's contraception mandate. And the five conservative justices found this just fine and dandy.

They opened a dangerous door.

What of a company owner who doesn't believe in X, or Y, or Z, say blood transfusions, immunizations, treatments for specific maladies? Watch out for more religious claims ahead.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act endeavors to keep shabby health plans from being fobbed off as the real McCoy by detailing specifically what must be covered. In this way, each individual in the land is ensured of a minimum, a plan that actually does what it is supposed to do: provide coverage, a backstop. It is an assurance that no one is being left out in the cold.

This includes, of course, comprehensive contraception coverage.

In the eyes of the current Supreme Court, corporations are people. If only the justices felt the same way about women.